The playback of an animated cartoon is performed by displaying continuously a series of picture frame thereof with an interval short enough to cause the visual attention of viewers. Because there is only a slight difference between consecutive picture frames, i.e., the still background is almost the same and the animated portion has only slight differences, the production of an animated cartoon can utilize this property to save production effort. After finishing the first picture frame, the second picture frame can be produced with relative ease by overlapping a tracing paper upon the first picture frame that is already finished and drawing only the distinction portion. The subsequent picture frames can be produced in a similar way.
A cartoon drawer is intended to facilitate the above procedures such as overlapping of tracing papers and shifting an upper an tracing paper to the desired position for painting.
The conventional cartoon drawing apparatus generally comprises a drawer, a drawing table and a lighting lamp. As shown in FIG. 1, the drawer of the conventional cartoon drawing apparatus generally comprises a casement (1), a ground glass (2) and upper/lower positioning rulers (3), wherein the casement (1) is disk-shaped and has a hollow central portion for accommodating the ground glass (2). Moreover, a pair of grooves (11) parallel to each other are formed on the casement (1) and located adjacent to the top and bottom side of the ground glass (2), respectively. The rulers and (3) are strip-shaped and can move within the grooves (11) in a lateral direction.
As shown in FIG. 2, the drawer with the casement (1), the ground glass (2) and the upper/lower positioning rulers (3) has the following arrangement. The casement (1) is placed within an aperture (41) formed on the top surface of the drawing table (4). A lighting lamp (5) is placed within the aperture (41). The tracing paper is illuminated by the light emitted from the lamp (5) through aperture (41) and the ground glass (2). Meanwhile, the tracing paper to be painted is placed upon the tracing paper already finished and the image of underlying paper can emerge by exposure to the light of the lamp (5). The cartoon creator can conveniently draw the upper paper by reference to the image of the underlying paper.
However, there are some drawbacks in a conventional cartoon drawing apparatus in that the manufacture of the drawer, the drawing, table and the lamp involves different levels of skill. The cartoon creators often need to buy the three components separately and set up by themselves. And worse, sometimes the lamp should be tailored to meet a special requirement. Although there are commercially-available drawing, apparatus which contain all the components, those components are manufactured separately and the cost is accordingly high. Moreover, the design of the drawer makes it difficult to use with another table.
It is the object of the present invention to provide a cartoon drawer with built-in lamp to overcome above drawbacks and save cost. The cartoon drawer with built-in lamp according to the present invention comprises a disk, a tank formed in the central portion of the disk, a ground glass plate placed upon the tank and covering the tank to allow the light of lamp within the tank to transmit therethrough, a pair of positioning rulers placed on the top/bottom sides of tank respectively, and a pair of the fixing plates placed on the outer side of the ruler respectively to guide the ruler laterally. By using, this arrangement, the cartoon drawer has a built-in lamp and the user only needs to place the cartoon drawer with built-in lamp within the aperture of the cartoon-drawing, table without the problem of buying and setting-up a lamp. Moreover, the user can utilize a common drawing table by forming an aperture of suitable size on the top surface of the common drawing table, thus saving cost.